


christmas but every time something is stolen it gets gayer

by protectoroffaeries



Category: Hamilton - Miranda
Genre: Eggnog, M/M, Stealing, Swearing, Underage Drinking, Wal-Mart, christmas trees, partially based on a true story, this is so dumb
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-18
Updated: 2017-01-18
Packaged: 2018-09-18 09:04:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,412
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9377816
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/protectoroffaeries/pseuds/protectoroffaeries
Summary: Laurens wants a live Christmas tree, dammit.





	

**Author's Note:**

> dumb. unedited. but it's kind of sweet and maybe funny. 
> 
> I had a bad day, so I hope this makes someone else smile at least.
> 
> And it is based on a true story...

 

Alex Hamilton loved Christmas. Fuckin’ loved it. Even when it was just him and his mama, and they didn’t have much between the two of him, he loved it. She would sing songs, and they would go to the early church service, and then she would give him something small - usually school supplies - and they would have the best meal that his mama could pull together. After she died, Alex didn’t think he’d be able to love Christmas like he did when he was a child - and it was true that he still cried on Christmas morning for his mama, not that he would admit that to anyone - but he kept his love of the season. It was what she would’ve wanted for him.

Now, Alex spent Christmas with the Washingtons. It was a much more elaborate affair than anything he’d done when he was young. Martha covered the house in decorations, and George put up a huge fir tree in the living room. They did go to the early morning church service. And Martha would put together a giant meal that they’d eat for a least week after Christmas. It was different. It was nice. 

Alex’s favorite part of the Christmas season, though? Spending time with his idiot friends when school let out for the holidays. They all got together on the 22nd or 23rd and hung out, drank, sometimes exchanged a few gifts. They’d been doing it since freshmen year of high school, the four of them: Laurens, Mulligan, Lafayette, and himself.

Four years later, and they were all seniors - hell, Alex was the only one who wasn’t eighteen yet - and they still sat around, passing a bottle of eggnog. They were outside, stumbling around in the snow on Lafayette’s block, laughing and being generally rambunctious, when Laurens said, “You know what I want for Christmas?”

“To get into Columbia?” Mulligan suggested. “Wait - that’s Alex.” Alex rolled his eyes; he knew perfectly well that Alex had already been accepted. Alex had only been going on about it since he received his acceptance letter. 

“More eggnog?” grumbled Lafayette, peering into the bottle as if glaring at it would make more appear.

“Justice for all?” Alex joked, sort of. A just world would be a great holiday present… if only it were feasible right now. Alex was working on it. He had big, big plans to change the world for the better, and he knew Laurens supported them. It was one of the many wonderful things about Laurens.

“Yeah,” Laurens said, and Alex wasn’t sure which thing he was agreeing to, or if he was just agreeing to all of them. “But I also really want a Christmas tree.”

“A Christmas tree?” echoed Mulligan. “You’re telling me your God-fearing father doesn’t put up a Christmas tree?” Alex couldn’t see it, either. The Laurens were good Southern Baptists. First ones to show up to church on Sunday and everything. He’d have expected them to be all over Christmas.

“He does, but it’s fake,” Laurens said sadly. “I want a real Christmas tree.” He stuck out his lip in a little pout, and, fuck, but he was adorable when he pouted.

“Why don’t we go get one, then?” Alex blurted. It was the pout. Alex couldn’t resist Laurens’ pouty face, dammit. He was weak.

“We have no money,  _ mon ami, _ ” Lafayette reminded them. He tossed the empty eggnog bottle into a nearby garbage can, and it shattered with a loud  _ clang _ that startled Alex, much to his annoyance. “And where would we put it?”

“We could put it in my room,” Laurens said. Alex imagined that it would be a logistical nightmare getting a tree into Laurens’ bedroom without anyone noticing, especially because it was on the second floor. But he was a little drunk, and so were his friends (except maybe Mulligan, who didn’t like eggnog so much), so they all nodded like that actually made sense.

“We still don’t have money,” Mulligan repeated, and Lafayette grinned like he was a genius for realizing that they were all broke from buying people Christmas gifts. Like they all didn’t know that.

Alex thought for a second. “What about that one outside the Walmart? You know, with the blue and white decorations.”

“Oh, that one’s pretty,” Laurens said.

“What about it?” asked Lafayette.

“Hamilton, no,” Mulligan shook his head, “we are not stealing a Christmas tree.”

Laurens jumped to his feet. “Why not?” he demanded. He looked excited, like he could run all the way down to the Walmart right now and drag it home behind him. “Laf, can we steal the Christmas tree?”

“Stealing is bad,” Lafayette said automatically, but there wasn’t a lot of strength behind his words.

“What if I steal you another bottle of eggnog?” asked Laurens with an impish grin.

Lafayette stood up, too, and Laurens whooped for joy. Mulligan sighed heavily, but he pulled his car keys out of his pocket and said, “I’m driving. The rest of you’ve had too much to drink, and I don’t feel like dying two days before Christmas.”

The four of them headed for Mulligan’s van, which was parked a little ways up the street. Lafayette and Laurens both raced for shotgun, but Lafayette shoved Laurens into a snowbank and yelled something rude at him in French that Alex refused to translate. He did, however, pull Laurens out of the snow. Laurens didn’t seem upset in the slightest, although snow was surely seeping through his woolen hat, and there were snowflakes in his curls. Alex couldn’t decide if he wanted to brush them away or not.

“See something you like?” Laurens giggled when he noticed Alex staring. Alex rolled his eyes, and told Laurens to get his ass in the car. Laurens did so with minimal stumbling. Alex made sure he actually put his seatbelt on, something Laurens tended to forget even when he was sober. Then, Mulligan drove them out of Lafayette’s neighborhood and down to their local Walmart.

Once Mulligan pulled into a parking space, he asked, “Are we really going to do this?”

“Yes!” shouted Laurens, and then he broke into giggles again.  _ God _ , thought Alex,  _ he is such a lightweight.  _ A cute lightweight, though.

“You owe me a bottle of eggnog,” Lafayette reminded him.

“Okay, okay, I’ll get the eggnog, and then we’ll all get the tree,” Laurens said. He smiled like he’d just come up with the perfect plan, and not a couple vague ones. Then he hopped out of the car and walked in almost a straight line toward Walmart’s entrance.

Alex got out after him, just as Mulligan was suggesting that someone go with him before he got himself banned from Walmart for life. “Laurens, wait up!”

Alex fell into step beside Laurens as they went through the automatic doors. They both waved to the elderly greeter (Laurens a little  _ too _ enthusiastically), and then they pushed their way to the liquor aisle. Laurens was wearing one of those puffy coats that made him look twice as large as he really was, and he slid a bottle off the shelf and into the inside pocket of his coat without drawing any attention to himself. Then he looked at Alex, who was shielding Laurens’ actions from a tiny camera with his body, and winked.

They wandered around in other aisles for a few minutes, and Alex bought a couple candy bars for forty cents each. Then they strolled out the door. Alex waited for an alarm to sound, but it never did. He supposed the eggnog wasn’t expensive enough to warrant one of those special tags.

Laurens ran over to where Mulligan and Lafayette were parked and proudly handed off the bottle to Lafayette, who immediately opened up the bottle and took a swig. Alex tossed one of the candy bars to Mulligan, who returned his kind gesture with a rude gesture of his own. KitKats weren’t eggnog, Alex supposed.

“Now can we get the tree?” Laurens asked eagerly.

“ _ Oui _ , you and Hamilton check to see if it is tied down in any way, and Mulligan will bring over the van,” Lafayette said.

“And you’ll sit there and boss everyone around,” Mulligan muttered. Lafayette flashed him a grin.

Alex followed Laurens over to the tree he’d suggested, the one with the blue and white decorations that was just out of the front entrance’s lighting. There was a tiny camera on it, too, and Alex couldn’t exactly shield an entire tree from view with his body (he was only like 5’5”, for fuck’s sake), so he kept his face hidden and tugged Laurens’ hat down low. Laurens fell into another fit of giggles. Alex didn’t mind; he quite liked Laurens’ giggles.

The tree was held up by a tree stand that wasn’t fastened to the ground, but was full of water. Oh, well. The back of Mulligan’s van would dry. Mulligan pulled up next to them, and he and Lafayette jumped out of the van. The four of them picked up the tree, and a couple ornaments fell off, shattering on the sidewalk far too loudly for Alex’s liking.

“Hey!” shouted the elderly greeter Laurens and Alex had waved to on their way in, “you boys get back here with that tree!”

Laurens started laughing  _ again _ because everything was funny to a drunk person, and they rushed to shove the tree in the van as the elderly greeter radioed for backup. Alex climbed in beside the tree and yanked Laurens in next to him. He pulled the back doors shut as Mulligan and Lafayette ran around to the front seats. Mulligan slammed on the gas, and they peeled out of the parking lot with a loud  _ screech _ of tires. Alex could hear the greeter shouting at them as the drove away, and he hoped no one saw Mulligan’s license plate.

Laurens grabbed Alex and pulled him into a selfie with the motherfucking tree in the background, which hurt his eyes because Laurens used the flash, but when he receive the picture in a text two minutes later, he was thankful for it. The flash also lit up Laurens’ face, and Alex could see all of his freckles and his crooked smile. Plus, there was that damn tree. Alex set it as his background.

When they arrived at Laurens’ house (which was really more of a mansion), Laurens went in first to see if his family was home. They weren’t. He came back out and the four of them carried the tree in through the front door and up the stairs. They broke a few more ornaments in the process. Not to mention the countless number of pine needles that were scattered across the pristine floor.

“I don’t want Luc to have to clean this mess up,” groaned Laurens once the tree, looked a little ragged now, was set up in a corner of his room. Luc was the Laurens’ housekeeper slash nanny, and Laurens adored her. “ Help me clean.”

“ _ Non _ ,” Lafayette said with a shake of his head, “I have a date with a bottle of eggnog.  _ Adieu _ .” He waved and walked back over to Mulligan’s van.

“You’ll drink yourself to death,” Mulligan called after him. Then to Laurens, he said, “I have to clean out my van in case anyone comes around asking questions. And I’ve gotta make sure Laf doesn’t over do it on the eggnog.”

“I’ll help you,” Alex offered. 

Laurens beamed. “See, Alex loves me,” he said to Mulligan, who rolled his eyes.

“Have a good Christmas, both of you. See ya next week,” Mulligan said, and then he went after Lafayette, who was now holding up the bottle of eggnog and singing praises to it in garbled French.

“You too, Mulligan. Tell Lafayette the same after he’s over his hangover,” replied Alex. Laurens just said, “Merry Christmas!” a little too loudly. The two of them went back inside as Mulligan and Lafayette drove off.

Alex ended up doing most of the cleaning because Laurens kept getting distracted and falling into more fits of laughter, but he didn’t mind. It wasn’t anything more than sweeping the stairs and the foyer. He only had to make sure he got all the little bits of the smashed ornaments, so that one of Laurens’ siblings wouldn’t step on them and get them stuck in their feet. When he was done, Alex led Laurens to his room, and they refilled the tree stand with more water, since most of it had sloshed onto Mulligan’s backseat. They were definitely going to hear about that later.

“That was fun,” Laurens said, flopping down on his bed.

“It was,” agreed Alex. How many people could say they stole a Walmart Christmas tree? Not that Alex planned on telling anyone.

“Lafayette is such a lush,” Laurens said with a dopey grin.

“You drank half the first bottle,” teased Alex.

“You and Mulligan should’ve had more,” Laurens protested. “Mulligan had like, one sip.”

“Mulligan doesn’t like eggnog.”

“Mulligan doesn’t like being drunk.”

“That’s why he’s the smart one.”

Laurens gave him a look that said  _ don’t play dumb _ . “You’re the smart one, Ham. And you can hold your liquor.”

Alex gave an exaggerated little bow.

“You’re my favorite person, you know? I say some shit like ‘I wanna Christmas tree’ and,” he motioned to his new tree, “you’re just like ‘let’s go get Laurens a fucking Christmas tree.’ Nobody else cares about what I want, but you, you always get me what I want, when you can. You know what else I want, Alexander?”

“What?” Alex asked, a little confused by Laurens’ usage of his first name - all of it.

“You. Come cuddle me.” Laurens opened his arms wide, and Alex scrambled to get in them. Laurens could have him, Laurens could have whatever the hell he wanted. Fuck. Alex had it so bad. He told himself to  _ calm down _ because Laurens was a cuddly person and also not sober.

Laurens looped an arm around him and nuzzled into his shoulder. “Merry Christmas, Hamilton,” he yawned.

“It’s the 23rd,” Alex reminded him gently.

“It’s Christmas,” Laurens insisted, and then he closed his eyes and fell asleep, curled around Alex.

Alex loved Christmas for so many reasons, and he’d written them all down, just like he wrote everything down. But he something he couldn’t capture with words was how much he loved John Laurens, and just how much Christmas with his friends meant to him. 

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  



End file.
